More Fun With Polls.

If, As Elvis Costello Once Said ...... that writing about music is like dancing about architecture, then writing about polls must be like ... we don't know ... cooking about movies.Or something equally nonsensical. Yet, here we find ourselves once again, in hapless thrall to yet another Quinnipiac University poll. It's an addiction, and we're not so proud that we can't admit it.And as we open the Connecticut-based university's latest canvass of 933 likely voters, we find Gov. Ed leading Lynn Swann 55-39 percent, with 6 percent undecided. This is basically the same as the last Quinnipiac poll in August that saw Rendell leading Swann 57-38 percent.More troubling for Swann, however, must be the poll's finding that independent voters are going Democratic 63-29 percent, and that Rendell commands greater loyalty among Democrats than Swann does amongst the GOP. That means that some Republican voters will be casting a Rendell ballot on Election Day."'Teflon Ed' remains untouchable," Quinnipiac pollster Clay F. Richards said. "The governor's political juggernaut continues to storm across Pennsylvania, while Lynn Swann's campaign is running on empty."Look for a full analysis of the Quinny poll in tomorrow's Morning Call.The rest of today's news, meanwhile, starts after the jump.

30-Second U.S. Senate Update (TM):Speaking of polls, the seemingly endless (and now, deathly boring) fight between Hermetic Bob and Our Rick is apparently a double-digit race again.In the first half of that new Quinny poll (which was actually released yesterday. They hold back the governor's thing to milk more publicity. Yeah, we know. Don't get us started), Casey led Santorum by 14 points among likely voters. In case you'd forgotten, that's double the margin from the August Quinny poll, and it's the third poll in less than a week showing Casey leading by at least 10 points.How did this happen, you ask?Well, plop yourself down, get cozy,and we'll tell you.With just six weeks to go before voters head to the polls, experts said the public has finally plugged into the MOST IMPORTANT U.S. SENATE RACE IN THE NATION, and thanks to a barrage of television commercials and that exercise in mass hypnosis that was the Sept. 3 debate on Meet The Press, Santorum's late-summer momentum has been halted."As people learn more about Casey to form an opinion, they think favorably of him," Quinny's Clay Richards said. Nearly four in 10 voters had a favorable impression of Casey the Younger, up eight points from a month ago.With his scary talk of Islamofascism, Santorum continues to be his own worst enemy. More than half of Casey's backers (55 percent) said their vote for the Democratic treasurer would come as more of a vote against Santorum, our man in Washington, Josh Drobnyk, reported this morning. "Santorum's biggest problem is Santorum," Richards said.

Then, Of Course, There's The Small Matter Of Money ...New campaign finance reports released yesterday paint a fairly dire picture for Lynn Swann.Through Sept. 18, Swann raised $3.7 million, spent $3.2 million and had
$3.7 million left, according to campaign finance reports filed with the
Pennsylvania Department of State. Swann also reported $104,817 worth of
in-kind contributions, in which a good or service, but not cash,
changes hands.Experts said that means Swann will largely be prevented from running
the kind of statewide television campaign he needs to close the
double-digit gap separating him from Gov. Ed in the
polls. ''When you have dwindling resources, you have to make strategic
choices,'' said Larry Ceisler, a Democratic consultant from
Philadelphia. ''Do you try to suppress Rendell in the southeast, or do
you try to bang him in the rest of the state? You won't win a campaign
making that decision.''Even after spending $4.7 million on a statewide advertising blitz,
Rendell still had $13.7 million, records show. He raised $6.6 million,
spent $6.62 million and had in-kind contributions totaling $161,320.It's gonna be a rough fall. Pay attention to the TV ad buys.

This Just In ...... Democrat Patricky Murphy and U.S. Rep. Mike Fitzpatrick, R-8th, don't see eye-to-eye on the implications of the National Intelligence Estimate. Wake us in November.

Meanwhile ...... experts are saying you should never trust a campaign's internal poll numbers. What??? Candidates manipulate poll questions to make their opponents look bad and to shore themselves up? We're aghast ...Good Thing We've Been Watching 'Deadwood' Dept.The state House has advanced (if you can even call it that) a bill that would allow people to use deadly force when they're threatened in their homes or cars, the online news service Capitolwire reports this morning.Right now, folks have to first retreat from an assailant and then employ deadly force as a means of self-defense. This bill, part of yesterday's special committee of the whole on crime, would effectively allow folks to shoot first and ask questions later. That beacon of enlightenment, Florida, has also approved similar legislation.The proposal was offered by Rep. Steve Cappelli, R-Lycoming, who said it was intended to give people "the right to defend self and family." Which, y'know, they can already do. This just makes it easier for some yutz with an itchy trigger finger to fulfill his Dirty Harry fantasies.

Dept Of Shameless Self-Promotion:Our faceless friends at PoliticsPA say that we, along with the Inky's Carrie Budoff and Philly City Paper's Mary Frangipanni-Patel are, like, so totally in right now. Sadly, the AP's Kim Helfing and Salena Zito from the Tribune-Review are out.We have no idea what any of this means. But since we're inveterate makers of lists, we'll graciously accept the honors.

On The Capitol Ideas iPod This Morning:Thanks to the handy-dandy copy of the New Musical Express that we picked up in our local Barnes & Borders over the weekend, we're grooving this morning to "Never Meant to Hurt You," the new single from English guitar-pop outfit The Good Shoes. It pays to stay current. You can never tell what kind of stuff you're going to stumble across.